Heart Disease Treatment Anderson IN

This page provides useful content and local businesses that can help with your search for Heart Disease Treatment. You will find helpful, informative articles about Heart Disease Treatment, including "Don't Go Breaking Your Heart", "Smiling Hearts", and "A Woman's Guide to". You will also find local businesses that provide the products or services that you are looking for. Please scroll down to find the local resources in Anderson, IN that will answer all of your questions about Heart Disease Treatment.

A Woman's Guide to

Q: What is a woman's biggest health risk? A: Surprisingly, it's cardiovascular disease. Learn how to protect your body's most vital organ by understanding what makes it tick.

By Lisa James

February 2005

One January morning, I woke at 8 am and decided to quit smoking. At 4 pm, I had a heart attack.

I’d had chest pains for over a month...and was diagnosed with...acid reflux and asthma....I was told...the chest pain I described was probably a pulled muscle from coughing....Now why would anyone think I was a candidate for heart disease? Well they didn’t, I didn’t, and I was.—Susan (Stories from the Heart, WomenHeart)

Susan has plenty of company. In the United States, 435,000 women suffer heart attacks every year, and many who have undergone the agony of an attack never saw it coming.

Heart attack is the leading killer of American women; more women than men have died of heart disease, stroke and other cardiovascular woes each year since 1984. Eight million women (equivalent: the population of New York City) are living with heart disease, a sizeable number of them under age 45.

It doesn’t have to be this way for you (or a woman you love). The first step is to recognize a heart attack as it’s happening, starting with the fact that women often don’t have what most people think of as a cardiac crisis.

Subtle Signs of Danger

While both men and women can suffer a “classic” heart attack—clutch at chest, keel over—a woman’s distressed heart is more likely to send out much subtler signs: shortness of breath, dizziness, nausea, sweating, back pain, chest discomfort. Even if such symptoms prompt a visit to the emergency room, the medical response may not be rapid enough.

“Seventy percent of men and women having a heart attack have chest pain or discomfort, but is the woman asked if she has chest discomfort?” says Sharonne Hayes, MD, Director of the Women’s Heart Clinic at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. “Maybe the nausea is the main symptom, maybe the back pain.” If emergency-room personnel don’t make the connection, treatment may not start until the heart is permanently damaged.

ER professionals aren’t the only ones who can misread the signs. Since most cardiac studies have been done on men, information about the dangers faced by female hearts has been slow in filtering down to GPs and gynecologists, the types of conventional doctors women are mostly likely to see on a regular basis. What’s more, a woman’s smaller blood vessels make standard interventions, such as bypass surgery, trickier.

Women themselves often don’t recognize the danger. Due to the protective effects of estrogen—which helps keep blood vessels flexible—women tend to have their first heart attacks after menopause, roughly ten years after men first run into cardiac trouble. That can lead to an it-can’t-happen-to-me attitude, which can obscure the danger posed by family history (a major risk factor for both genders). As Dr. Hayes puts it,...

Don't Go Breaking Your Heart

Stressed about work? Depressed about a relationship? Bummed about life in general? Well, snap out of it! Because if you don't, it will be your heart that snaps.

By Susan Weiner

February 2005

Two years ago, I decided to make a radical life change. With my two dogs, nearly a dozen cats and three chickens in tow, I drove a rented van 280 miles to a new home in a small town in upstate New York. But about halfway through the trip, I became despondent, emotional and panic-stricken.

And my passengers, howling and crying behind me, didn’t sound like they were handling the move any better. My mind raced uncontrollably. I had spent months planning and preparing for this move.

Why on earth, I asked myself, was I leaving behind a comfortable house in the New York City suburbs, a steady job, a pleasant lifestyle, and friends and family I loved?

The feelings of guilt, apprehension and uncertainty caused a resounding sadness that ran so deep it hurt to breathe. And weeks after settling into my new life, I still found it difficult to function. I had trouble sleeping and eating, I lost weight and I felt overwhelmed by the simplest tasks. I had to come to grips with the fact that, officially, I was clinically depressed.

I already knew what most people know about the factors that define depression—sadness, pessimism, anxiety, lack of energy, sleep disorders, disinterest in sex, and appetite and weight fluctuations. I even knew that the combination of such depressive symptoms triggers spikes in blood pressure and can hamper the immune system. What I didn’t know, and what millions of other people also don’t know, is that a high level of stress and clinical depression can lead to heart disease.

Losing Heart

Here’s a depressing statistic: Nearly one in 20 American adults experiences major depression in a given year. Add to that stat the one in three people who suffer from depression after being diagnosed with heart disease or surviving a heart attack. Despite enormous advances in the understanding of brain chemistry and societal acceptance of the condition, depression often goes undiagnosed and untreated, with only about one-third seeking help, reports the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).

In a domino effect, the emotional distress that causes depression can set off considerably more serious physical symptoms, such as irregular or rapid heartbeat, high blood pressure, elevated insulin and cholesterol levels, and faster blood clotting (Depression and Anxiety 1998). A depressed individual may feel just slightly apathetic and sluggish, yet internally his or her stress hormones could be soaring, increasing the heart’s workload. The combination of these risk factors is a potential recipe for a cardiac catastrophe.

A six-year study of 4,500 heart-healthy people 65 and older suggested that the mental stress which accompanies depression could encourage the blockage of blood vessels and help create a hospitable climate for hea...

Smiling Hearts

Smiling Hearts

Boost your cardiac health by caring for your pearly whites.

by Linda Melone

February 2009

The state of your mouth says a great deal about your overall health. Gum problems, for example, can create low-grade inflammation, which in turn can create an increased risk of developing such systemic disorders as high blood pressure and heart disease.

“Gum disease not only increases your risk of having a heart attack, but men have a 67% higher chance of developing pancreatic cancer and pregnant women have a seven times greater chance of having a premature, low-weight baby,” says Gerald P. Curatola, DDS, founder of www.RejuvinationDentistry.com and clinical associate professor at New York University’s College of Dentistry. Taking a proactive approach to oral health may help reduce these risks.

The Heartfelt Connection A link between oral care and heart disease may seem unlikely. But while the exact mechanism is under debate, studies show that people with higher levels of disease-causing oral bacteria were more likely to have atherosclerosis in the carotid artery, potentially leading to a stroke (Circulation 2/8/05).

One theory regarding the oral- cardiovascular connection involves bacteria from the gums entering the bloodstream. There they are thought to attach themselves to fatty arterial deposits called plaques that can cause blockages. Other researchers believe the body’s own natural defenses against bacteria may trigger the sort of chronic inflammation that has been found to underlie many disease processes, including heart problems. It may increase diabetes risk; in fact, tooth decay and gum problems can be early signs of diabetes. Having both diabetes and gum disease also makes controlling blood sugar levels tougher.

While certain bacteria in the mouth may be connected to heart disease, other bacteria are essential for good health. “The solution is in finding the right balance,” says Curatola. “Not all bacteria need to be eliminated with mouthwashes and toothpaste. In fact, doing so could cause more problems by eliminating a biofilm [a community of microorganisms] essential for a healthy mouth.” Some mouthwashes and toothpastes eliminate good bacteria, says Curatola. “Many toothpastes are actually flavored detergents,” he says. “Ingredients such as chlorhexidine and other antibacterial agents are also found in floor cleaners and pesticides.”

Making Your Mouth Happy “A holistic approach to oral care is based on an understanding of how a healthy mouth looks and functions and how it influences and is influenced by the rest of the body,” says Robert T. McBride, DDS, of the Dental Wellness Center in Long Beach, California. “Fixing a broken tooth, for example, without looking for the source of the problem can make the problem worse. Is there a bite problem or bone loss [osteoporosis] and why? Diagnosis is key.” Proper diagnosis requires an oral health assessment. A thorough examination should incl...

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